Personal Life
He was born Brian Robson Rankin on 28 October 1941 in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. As a child, he played the banjo and piano. After he heard one of Buddy Holly's songs, he decided to also learn the guitar.
He chose the name Hank Marvin while launching his music career. The name is an amalgamation of his childhood nickname of Hank, which he used to differentiate himself from a number of friends also named Brian, and Marvin Rainwater, a country and western singer.
When Marvin was 16, he travelled with his Rutherford Grammar School friend Bruce Welch to London, where he met Johnny Foster, Cliff Richard's manager, at The 2i's Coffee Bar in Soho. Foster was looking for a guitarist for Richard's upcoming tour of the U.K., and Marvin agreed to join as long as there was also a place for Welch. Foster had actually been looking for guitarist Tony Sheridan at the 2i's, but by chance he encountered Marvin. Marvin and Welch joined The Drifters, as Cliff Richard's group was then known, beginning their careers as professional guitar players.
Marvin met Cliff Richard for the first time at a nearby Soho tailor's shop, where Richard was having a fitting for a pink stage jacket. They had their first rehearsal with him at his parents' home in Cheshunt.
Marvin lived in the hills above Perth, Western Australia from 1986 but has since relocated to a luxury apartment in East Perth. He is a committed Jehovah's Witness. Marvin runs a successful recording studio: Nivram studios (part of Sh-Boom studios in Tiverton street owned by Trevor Spencer and Gary Taylor).
In the UK, his name is often humorously recognised as cockney rhyming slang for the word "starving". This slang was referenced in a 2012 TV advertisement for Mattesons.
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